1. Field
The presently disclosed subject matter relates to vehicle headlight systems, and more particularly to vehicle headlight systems including a high beam module used as a marking lamp to alert drivers to an existence of pedestrian in a forward direction of a subject vehicle, and also the vehicle headlight systems having favorable light distribution patterns, which can be easy to drive at night, and which can prevent a lamp unit including the high beam module from emitting a glare type light to oncoming vehicles on an oncoming traffic lane and forward vehicles moving forward on a driving lane.
2. Description of the Related Art
When at least one pedestrian (including people cycling) exists in a forward direction of a vehicle while drivers steer the vehicle, an optical technology in which the drivers are alerted by marking the pedestrian with a light-emission in a direction toward the pedestrian has be known. For example, a conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus is disclosed Patent document No. 1 (Japanese Patent No. 5,262,057). FIG. 7a is a block diagram showing the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus disclosed in Patent document No. 1, and FIG. 7b is an explanatory view showing a light-emitting pattern projected by the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus.
The conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 includes: a camera 120 configured to photograph a space as image data in a forward direction of a subject vehicle using the apparatus 100; a human detector 130 configured to detect a pedestrian from the image data output from the camera 120; a distance sensor 140 configured to detect a distance from the subject vehicle to the pedestrian detected by the human detector 130; a rudder angle sensor 150 configured to detect a direction of the pedestrian with respect to the subject vehicle; a speed sensor 160 configured to detect a moving speed of the subject vehicle; and a dangerous extent detector 170 configured to detect a dangerous extent of the pedestrian as human data with respect to the subject vehicle according to the detected pedestrian, the distance between the pedestrian and the subject vehicle, the direction of the pedestrian and the moving speed of the subject vehicle.
In addition, the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 also include a variable light 180 configured to emit light in a direction toward the pedestrian while the light shows the distance between the pedestrian and the subject vehicle; and a lighting driver 175 configured to emit the light from the variable light 180 in accordance with a light-emitting signal output from the dangerous extent detector 170, when the dangerous extent detector 170 judges a dangerous case from the human data.
When the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 detects a pedestrian 500 from the human detector 130 via the image data from the camera 120, the alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 may project an alerting light-emitting pattern 400 in a direction toward the pedestrian 500. In this case, the alerting light-emitting pattern 400 may alert a driver of the subject vehicle incorporating the alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 that a directional light-emitting 450 informs about a direction toward the pedestrian 500 and a distance light-emitting pattern 420 informs about the distance from the subject vehicle to the pedestrian 500.
However, when the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 generates the alerting light-emitting pattern 400, the alert light-emitting pattern 400 is formed in a spot-light shape. Hence, when the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 detects the pedestrian 500, which is located in a direction toward a relative large angle with respect to a moving direction of the subject vehicle, for example, which is located in a forward direction of the subject vehicle moving on a curved road, it may be very difficult for the alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 to accurately project the alerting light-emitting pattern 400 toward the pedestrian 500. The above-described main reason why is that the conventional alerting light-emitting apparatus 100 may be separated from a headlight including a high beam and a low beam.
The above-referenced Patent Documents and additional Patent Documents are listed below and are hereby incorporated with their English abstracts and specification in their entireties.    1. Patent Document No. 1: Japanese Patent No. 5,262,057    2. Patent Document No. 2: Japanese Patent Application Laid Open JP 2010-49861    3. Patent Document No. 3: Japanese Patent Application Laid Open JP 2013-152812
The disclosed subject matter has been devised to consider the above and other problems, characteristics and features. Thus, exemplary embodiments of the disclosed subject matter can include vehicle headlight systems using a headlight controller and a lamp unit including a high beam module, which can emit favorable light distribution patterns toward at least one pedestrian as a marking light to alert drivers to an existence of pedestrian in a forward direction of a subject vehicle.
In addition, when the pedestrian and at least one forward vehicle do not exist in the forward direction of the subject vehicle, the vehicle headlight system can also provide favorable light distribution patterns to safely drive at night by overlapping a light distribution pattern projected from the high beam module with each of the light distribution patterns for a high beam and a low beam. When the at least one forward vehicle exists in the forward direction of the subject vehicle, the vehicle headlight system can prevents the lamp unit from emitting a glare type light to oncoming vehicles and vehicles moving forwards in the forward direction of the subject vehicle.